Australian singer Hayley Jensen was by her father's side when he lost his battle with lymphoma

Jensen, 35, had been caring for her 60-year-old dad, Rod Thomas, during the final stages of lymphoma when he asked his daughter to go to the shops and buy him a soft woollen underlay for his bed.

"He just wanted his bed to be more comfortable," Jensen tells 9Honey. "I hadn't left him alone the whole time he'd been home from hospital and I was reluctant to go, but my husband Kris was there and he kept telling me he'd be alright for us to go and to get the best one I could find."

The last photo taken of Hayley and her father at the Tamworth Country Music Festival earlier this year. (Supplied )

While she was at the shops, the singer received a frantic call from her dad telling her to come back quickly.

"He had a major infection and was breaking out in a sweat," Jensen says. "The bed was saturated by the time I got back."

The singer says she had trouble getting hold of her father's carers so called an ambulance, however her dad refused to go.

"A couple of hours later he started losing his breath," Jensen recalls. "It was just horrible."

With his final breaths, Thomas asked for his puffer which had been organised for him after he developed breathing problems.

"It was really traumatic," Jensen recalls. "I didn't want to see him go but I knew he didn't want to be revived because we'd had that conversation."

As time goes by, Jensen says she's grateful she was there with him for his final moments, to let him know how much she loved him.

Hayley Jensen and her father Rod had always shared a special bond. (Supplied )

Lymphoma is cancer of the lymphatic system, the body's disease-fighting network, and it can include the lymph nodes, spleen, thymus gland and bone marrow.

The main types of lymphoma are Hodgkin's lymphoma and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

"He was always my biggest supporter," Jensen says of her father. "His walls were covered in posters of me singing and album covers. He was a big music lover and music was always on at home."

Jensen says a particular favourite was Eagles: Hell Freezes Over and they watched it together often during his last few weeks.

In fact it was her father who suggested she perform 'Angel' by Sarah McLachlan on Australian Idol, the song that helped put her on the map.

Rod Thomas suffered from a rare and aggressive form of the cancer called Mantle Cell Lymphoma which is fast-growing and requires immediate treatment.

At the time he was diagnosed with the cancer - in 2014 - Thomas was living in Wodonga in Victoria and had to travel to Melbourne for treatment up to a four-hour drive away.

Despite her parents divorce, Jensen remained close to her father until his death from cancer in 2016. (Supplied )

"It was really quite traumatic for him to have to leave his home to go all the way to Melbourne for treatment, to not be in his home and around his family," she says.

While the Leukaemia Foundation offered Thomas a range of services to help support him, Jensen says she wanted to be there for her father as she was his only child.

"Mum and dad separated when I was young, so it was really just me and dad going through this and trying to navigate our way through it," she says.

The nightmare began one day when, while putting on deodorant, Thomas noticed a lump under his arm.

"Knowing him I probably didn't hear about it until a few months after that," she says. "By the time he found out what it was, he told me he was well into stage four."

Jensen says doctors initially told her father that his cancer was treatable, but further treatment revealed the devastating truth.

"He actually went to his doctor after he found the lump and when they got the test results they told him it was good news, that he had cancer but they could fix it," she says. "They told him they'd send him to Melbourne to get more tests done and treatment and he should be right."

He began treatment and was even in remission at one stage. Jensen says he even went back to work part-time as a grader driver.

"But he'd lost a lot of sensation in his fingers and toes and he was also finding it hard to concentrate," Jensen recalls. "And it did come back sadly. The lump came back under his arm."

They remained hopeful until the very end. (Supplied )

At that stage the only option was to put Thomas on a trial drug which wouldn't save his life, but may extend it.

"It gave us another six months or so together," Jensen says of their final months together. "Unfortunately there were side effects such as his platelet levels falling, so they had to take him off it."

Jensen and husband Kris were in Japan when they received a call from Thomas telling them he was in extreme pain.

"He had an appointment in an hour and was trying to hold out," she says. "I told him to go to the hospital but he went to the doctor instead. They sent him to hospital and it was quick from that point."

Jensen recalls her father being in so much pain, so she flew in from Sydney to be with him and find out exactly what was going on.

"He had pains in his stomach and thought there was something else wrong," she says. Instead, the cancer had spread and Thomas was living on borrowed time.

"It was the end of the journey at that point," she says. "I was sitting in the courtyard of the hospital allowing dad time to rest when the doctor came over and told me there was nothing more they could do.

Jensen says her dad was her biggest supporter when it came to music. (Supplied )

"It was the darkest day of my life and then going back into the hospital and having to work through that with him...I think we had so much hope for so long."

Jensen says she tried to stay positive for her father but quickly learned how ruthless cancer can be.

Her father wanted to die at home, like so many suffering from terminal illnesses.

"He hated being in hospitals," she says. "He wanted to be in his own bed in his own chair in his own home, so we basically got sent home with an armful of medications and a phone number to call."

When it became clear Thomas didn't have long, husband Kris joined her. They'd been told her dad could have a month left to live once he left hospital that final time.

He lasted 10 days.

She remembers her father saying, "They've kept me alive for long enough, I just want to go."

Jensen told her dad she didn't want him to go, but he was just in so much pain.

The father and daughter attended the Tamworth Country Music Festival together in January 2016 where he watched Jensen perform. He passed away in April.

Jensen has written a song for her dad called 'You With Me', released on her new album Turning Up The Dial.

"I feel like he is always with me," she says. "I still do feel he is with me and I hear his voice telling me to go for it and don't ever give up and to keep up with the music.

Jensen has today as a Gold Ambassador for the 'Light The Night' event for the Leukaemia Foundation (Supplied)

Hayley Jensen was today announced as a Gold Ambassador for the 'Light The Night' event for the Leukaemia Foundation on October 5, when lanterns will light up the night sky in capital cities around the country in memory of the many Australians who have died from blood cancers.

Light The Night is the only event in Australia that brings together people affected by blood cancer. From people with their own diagnosis, their friends, family, medical professionals, researchers – as well as those who are there to remember someone who we have lost.

This year the event is raising funds to go to breakthrough medical research to step us closer to a future free of blood cancer.